


This Side of the Blue

by notabadday



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, angsty with a chance of happy endings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-28
Updated: 2015-10-28
Packaged: 2018-04-28 16:40:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5097731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notabadday/pseuds/notabadday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a follow up to 3x05, '4722 Hours'. Kind of a fix-it fic for everyone who's kind of flipping out at the moment. Stay strong, friends. Have some happy endings all around, on me.</p><p>  <i>It’s Will who tells Fitz about Jemma’s endless Fitzing and the many times he’s heard that birthday message. It’s casual and breezy, like he doesn’t have a clue that it’s supposed to go unsaid; it’s as though he’s assumed that with all those Fitzes, it must surely be a consummated, spoken love. Fitz need not correct him. Will doesn’t know the weight of these secrets. It’s not for Will to know.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	This Side of the Blue

**Author's Note:**

> Obviously I wrote this in a day so it may not be my magnum opus, but I hope you enjoy it nevertheless! I wanted to post it today because the fandom is imploding slightly and, y'know, I just want to instill some hope in your hearts.

The mission is its own distraction from the mission. Fitz compartmentalizes. He pragmatically digs through every painful clue that six months of torture brought him, each one still embedded with false leads and broken dreams.

 Jemma swallows down the enormity of his efforts. It’s everything she would have expected of him, but seeing it laid out across tables and screens brings the reality of it to life. The references to artifacts he’s acquired come with offhand explanations of near-death situations that reinforce every mixed feeling that torments her.

 They’re quiet, tiptoeing clumsily around each other, neither wanting to infringe on the other’s boundaries. He stops asking questions, avoids the cruel pain of answers by running on the need-to-know. The only further details he ascertains are of her scientific research: their common interest. It works well enough. The day-to-day of the mission at hand becomes the new normal, a comfort in its own right, the shared goal uniting them while at once tearing them in two.

 They rebuild the portal because of course they do; there’s nothing they can’t do when they’re together. Even if it’s a broken kind of together. And when they cut a hole through time and space, Fitz goes through first and calls out the name of the spaceman no one’s seen for fourteen years – no one except Jemma Simmons.

 When Will emerges through a cloud of sand, he looks like a ghost. Fitz pulls him back by the hand just before Jemma emerges into the nightmare with them. The sight of Fitz pulling Will back towards the portal as the astronaut struggles against the whipping sand makes Jemma’s heart drop. It’s over before she can react, though. In an instance, they’re back on this side of the blue: Fitz, Jemma and Will all collapsed at the bottom of a hole in the earth – but it is _earth_ , and that’s what’s important.

 Fitz and Jemma sit up and share a look: relief, gratitude, grief. Fitz then quickly turns his attention to Will, who lies silently, eyes wide.

 “You with me?” Fitz asks, propping him up. “You’re home safe now, Will.”

 Jemma wonders if it’s the change in oxygenation levels that takes her breath away or the scene unfolding in front of her. She can’t compose herself and weeps silently as she moves towards the two men, her attention torn between them.

 Will looks at Fitz and gives a dazed smile, like he’s woken up and everything suddenly makes sense. “You’re Fitz.”

 

***

 

It’s Will who tells Fitz about Jemma’s endless Fitzing and the many times he’s heard that birthday message. It’s casual and breezy, like he doesn’t have a clue that it’s supposed to go unsaid; it’s as though he’s assumed that with all those Fitzes, it must surely be a consummated, spoken love. Fitz need not correct him. Will doesn’t know the weight of these secrets. It’s not for Will to know.

 The astronaut is an alien on his own planet. That's what fourteen years in another solar system does.

He struggles to adapt, struggles beyond Jemma’s experience. She gets stronger, relaxing into her own recovery as she focuses her energy on helping Will through his. No one questions the decision to let Will stay at the base with S.H.I.E.L.D. because Jemma’s word is final; her ordeal has afforded her that power, at least. Coulson’s a soft touch for her these days and she uses it to her advantage.

 Fitz helps more than anyone. He covers for Jemma when Coulson needs her to work, becomes her Bobbi. He conceals and represses better than ever. He makes Will cups of coffee as an excuse for checking in when he knows Jemma can’t.

 It’s only Bobbi that sees the secrets he’s burying deeper than ever.

 On a quiet day, a concerned Bobbi gingerly asks how he is while Fitz is organising his research into archives. He shrugs without looking up prompting her to place a supportive hand on his back, and she feels him slump.

 “You know, you’re not on your own. If you need to talk, or shout, or scream… anytime,” Bobbi offers.

 “He says she talked about me,” Fitz confesses, the admission surprising even him. “What do you think that means?”

 “It’s not surprising… but you should talk to Simmons.”

 He ignores the suggestion for a long time. He files the idea away with all that archived research. Bobbi means well but she couldn’t possibly understand, Fitz convinces himself. Besides, it’s too soon. Will’s presence, broken and benevolent as it might be, looms over them. He’s the elephant in rooms he’s not even in.

 Fitz begins to notice something as the weeks fall away. Jemma – _his Jemma_ – reemerges, relieved of the survivor’s guilt that had tormented her so deeply. The weeks of recalibrating all of the monolith research are worth it for that alone, Fitz thinks whenever he sees little pieces of his old friend come home. She finds a spring in her step, the way she would when she was working on something really exciting, potentially groundbreaking.

 During a workshop of some new tech, Jemma talks to him about Will. “He’s doing remarkably well, don’t you think?” she asks.

 Fitz nods and coolly replies, “Your hard work is paying off.” He forces a smile. She believes it and he’s glad that she does.

 

***

 

The next time he sees Will, it’s in the gym with Hunter and Coulson. Their boss is joking with the former astronaut about S.H.I.E.L.D. recruitment when Fitz walks in as Will is brushing him off: “I think I’ve had enough adventures for one lifetime.”

 “Fair play, mate,” Hunter replies, dropping the weight he’s holding as Will continues lifting (a little more) beside him.

 “Hey Fitz,” Will says as he spots him.

 “You’re not normally in here,” Hunter comments, earning a glare from Fitz. “I didn’t mean it like that! So sensitive.” He shakes his head.

 “I came to see how you are,” Fitz explains to Will, genuine concern softening his tone. “You haven't been around the lab for a while.”

 “Not really my place,” Will replies, putting the weight in his hands down before wiping his sweaty brow with one of the monogrammed S.H.I.E.LD. towels.

 The lab was once the only place Will ever went other than the kitchen and his own room. He would shadow Simmons, trying to find something to do to distract from the monsters that lived inside his head. She understood, of course, but Fitz could see him getting under her feet. Days where Will would wander to play the X-box with Mack or hang out in the gym with May, Hunter or Bobbi were a sign of progress. This is progress. Fitz makes a note to himself to let Jemma know, just in case she doesn’t already.

 “That’s how I feel about the gym,” Fitz says lightly, gesturing in Hunter's direction.

 Coulson shifts awkwardly in the background, trying to conjure a throwaway joke about not having a hand, but is disappointed when nothing relevant comes. Instead, he chooses to ask where Simmons is.

 Will and Fitz look at each other and find that neither has the answer.

 Progress, Fitz thinks. The mystery of it doesn’t seem to faze Will. Progress.

 

***

 

Eventually, the day comes where Fitz wakes up and his gut says that it’s time for _the talk_. He’s not even sure which one of them is putting it off. To begin with, it was impossible to catch Jemma without her shadow. But things are different now. Fitz has watched her rebuild and, in turn, watched Will do the same. It’s been as long on this side of the blue as the other. On his way to the lab come early morning, his footsteps take him elsewhere; he knocks on her bedroom door and clears his throat.

 There’s no answer. Odd. He heads to Jemma’s second home, the lab, only to discover she’s not there either. Nor is she in the kitchen. She’s nowhere to be found. And neither is Will. He searches the rest of the base but there’s no sign.

 She’s left. Without a word, gone again. And he can’t believe he didn’t see it coming, Will and Jemma going off together just as soon as they’ve recovered, or recovered enough.

 Jemma wonders whether leaving a note would have been wiser, but the idea of leaving him hanging troubles her, of leaving him with a promise of more while risking that the terrible miracles of the world won’t come between them again. She naively hopes he won’t notice her absence, hopes the separation will be brief enough to escape explanation. It’s complicated. It’ll make more sense on the way back. That’s how she convinces herself anyway.

 When they say goodbye on the doorstep of a house he doesn’t know, it’s sad but it’s right. There’s a comforting rightness about it that makes it possible. Jemma kisses Will sweetly on the lips, looks at him one last time and walks back down the garden path. She lingers at the gate to watch the door open. An older lady appears in the doorway and crashes to the floor with the cry of a mother who thought she would never see her child again. Will accepts a slightly awkward, but tender, hug and disappears inside, catching a final glimpse of the ghost of a friend disappearing in the distance before the door closes behind him.

 

***

 

“I took Will home,” Jemma says, appearing from nowhere in the doorway of the lab she built from nothing while Fitz busies himself on one of the computers. It’s the one he likes the best, the one he uses to read articles about unusual species of monkeys and the one he uses to Skype his mother. 

 He looks up: a little startled, a little comforted. His eyes soften when they land on her. “Home?”

 “Hunter helped me track down his family. They moved around a bit since he last saw them but,” she pauses, taking a deep breath, “we found his mother living in a little town in Connecticut. He’s gonna be okay, Fitz – thanks to you.”

 “Are you?” he asks, finally turning to look at her.

 “ _He’s home_ ,” she says again in a sigh, tears spilling from her eyes.

 Fitz nods.

 “I want… home,” Jemma says.

 “Sheffield?”

 She laughs but it’s a messy scoff of a laugh, the tightness in her chest and the hoarseness of her voice taking away anything he might confuse with amusement. “ _You_ are home, Fitz.”

 His head bows.

 “I just had to save him. That’s all,” she explains, like it was nothing. _That’s all_. “He helped me and I couldn’t have lived with myself if I didn’t help him.”

 “Jemma, you love him,” Fitz says generously, a kind of patience in his tone that imbues the message with the warm selflessness that has, for so long, defined him. It’s her ticket out, all he can do to soothe the guilt she feels towards him.

 She shakes her head with desperate urgency, and moves closer to insist, “I had to love him. He was all I had out there when every ingenious idea to get home blew up in my face and I thought I was never gonna see you again.” She pauses to swallow. Her mouth is so dry it takes her back to the cruel wasteland that keeps her awake at night. It’s sand filling her mouth as she tries to call out to him, as she tries to speak. She digs deep to continue: “I wouldn’t have survived if I’d let myself wallow in the grief of missing you. You were my lifeline, _you_ , but then every glimmer of hope disappeared and you went from being my light... to being the most relentlessly painful memory,” Jemma confesses, her hand resting on her chest in a futile attempt to calm her breathing as she cries. “As soon as I started to believe I couldn’t get back, you became my torture.

  “And he was a distraction. It was something to tell myself to make unbearable days almost bearable. The pretence that we had something special, that we were in love, it kept both of us alive. But now I’m back here because you did it, you saved us, and all I want is you. _You_ are what’s real. The way I feel about you is real.”

 She tries to smile but the movement of her cheeks lifting only makes more tears fall.

 His reaction is slow and cautious. She catches sight of his shaking hands and the way his eyes shut tight. No words.

 “Fitz.” It’s like a breath, that favorite word of hers.

 “You’re not going to lose me, Jemma,” he assures her, but it carries the weight of rejection on it. It’s an apology.

 “I know that,” she replies without hesitation, because if there’s anything she knows, it’s that. “But it’s about more than that.”

 And three words tell him all he needs to know.

 “This is how I feel. How do you feel?”

 “Scared,” Fitz confesses against his better judgment.

 

***

 

Neither Fitz nor Jemma is sure of what conclusions to draw from their conversation. It helps. They’re a step closer to one another but a gulf remains between them. Each day breaks it down, makes it smaller, brings them closer. They give it time, let it breathe.

 They’re playing around in the lab, a sign of progress, when it happens. A misguided experiment pertaining to the development of inhuman-strength ammo causes a minor explosion on one of the workbenches in the lab. Simmons commands their underlings to evacuate as she rushes to Fitz, lying dazed on the floor.

 “Fitz!” she says, and through her worry there’s a smile at that favorite word. “Fitz?” Her face hovers over his as she watches him come to. “Oh, Fitz!”

 He smiles at her in a flashback. There’s a joy to it: that feeling. There’s joy once more in loving her, and it brings a grin to his face, which in turn brings one to hers. It had been so heavy, weighing more than he could bear to carry for so long and repressed for the purposes of self-preservation. But as she smiles over him on the floor of their shared home, the church in which they both kneel to science, he feels that flutter – light and magic and euphoric.

 He laughs a little bit and tells her, “I’m fine, I’m fine.”

 “How could you misjudge the proportions so dramatically?” she asks in a playfully reprimanding tone that turns back the clock. It’s not eggshells and tiptoes. It’s Fitzsimmons in its purest incarnation.

 “I thought you’d done the measurements,” he explains defensively.

 She sighs. “No, those were just notes. I hadn’t verified anything. You couldn’t wait to talk to me about it?” Jemma rolls her eyes.

 “I didn’t know where you were,” he argues, his voice ascending to a higher pitch.

 “I went off for, what, fifteen minutes? Snack break. I brought you back some fruit but-” She gestures to an empty pot lying on the floor a few steps away, with strawberries having rolled out all over the floor.

 He makes a face about her snack choice before pulling himself to sit up beside her.

 “You’re okay?” she checks, brushing off non-existent dust from the shoulder of his shirt. “You didn’t hit your head at all?”

 “Don’t fuss, Jemma. I’m okay.” Fitz forces a smile in an effort to convince her but when he sees that her concern is earnest and not inconsiderable, he indulges her a little more: “I didn’t hit my head. I promise. I landed on my arm.”

 Jemma’s shoulders drop and she nods gratefully at him.

 Something passes between them in a look. Their faces are at the same level, closer than usual, and there’s a curiosity in both of their expressions. It’s Jemma who asks the question and Fitz who answers, leaning slowly forward and placing a delicate kiss on her lips. He feels her smile against him before their kiss deepens, time stopping and the world falling at their feet. 

What starts as tentative and coy quickly becomes frantic and tactile, hands moving encouragingly as they forget to draw breath.

 When it ends, Fitz gives her another light kiss. It’s this that prompts Jemma to blush. This, and the way he gazes at her when he pulls away from her lips: close-up and without inhibition. His fingertips sit gently on her cheeks, as though reaching out to authenticate that she’s real, as he looks for her reaction.

 “Can we have this?” she asks, caution slowing the words as they leave her lips.

 “I hope so,” he says, exhaling the words.

 “I love you, Fitz.” She thinks about adding, ‘and I miss you’, but the reminder of their separation – every separation they’ve endured – has no place in this conversation. She smiles brightly, eyes sparkling with tears, hoping that they might at last be allowed a little togetherness.

 “About time,” he replies playfully, instead of all the ‘I’ve loved you since the first time you finished one of my sentences’ drafts in his head. There’ll be time for the weight of it in due course. This moment is instead light – dizzying, like shy pre-teens with the first flutter of butterflies. He beams back at her, a perfect mirror of her smile, and simply adds, “I love you.” It comes out as easy as a breath.

 There’s a beat before she abruptly asks, “Can we get off this floor now, because any combination of chemicals and bacteria could be down here?”

 “Way to kill a moment,” Fitz says with a smile.

 “We could go back to my room?” she suggests, teasing him a little and enjoying the reaction she gets as his eyes look about ready to fall out of their sockets. He nods a few too many times before offering her a hand up.

 “Might need to clean up first.” He looks around at the mess made by the unsuccessful experiment.

 Jemma – the queen of hygiene and tidiness – shrugs.  “Leave it. We’ve wasted enough time.”

 Those haunting blue eyes of his look at her with so much affection and relief that she can’t help but laugh nervously under their spotlight. She wants to kiss him, hold him, touch him.

 With a nervous grin, she reaches out for his hand and leads him away from the lab.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Feedback is always delightful if you have the time.


End file.
